“A novel way to take healthcare, etc., away from people AND make it look like there are fewer poor people.”

The Poor People’s Campaign has mobilized nationally to fight the Trump administration’s attacks on the poor. (Photo: Becker1999/flickr/cc)

The Trump administration on Monday moved to change the definition of “poverty” in the United States in a proposal which combines the president’s attempts to portray the U.S. economy as strong with his repeated attacks on the working poor and their access to government services.

In a regulatory filing, President Donald Trump’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) wrote that it may change how inflation is calculated in order to reduce the number of Americans who are living below the federally-recognized poverty line and are therefore eligible for certain government support services and social programs.Continue reading →

The president is attempting to hand the Pentagon even more than it asked for while gutting programs for ordinary Americans

While giving the bloated Pentagon “even more than it hoped for” by boosting U.S. military spending to $750 billion—an increase of $34 billion from last year—President Donald Trump’s 2020 budget would cut Medicaid by $1.1 trillion over the next decade.

Set to be unveiled on Monday, the president’s budget will call for a total of $2.7 trillion in cuts to safety net programs, environmental protection, food and housing assistance, and foreign aid over ten years, according to a summary reviewed by the Washington Post. Continue reading →

Protest plans come as concerns mount about impacts of the ongoing government shutdown, including on food stamps and Medicare

As the partial government shutdown entered its 19th day on Wednesday—well on its way to becoming the longest in U.S. history—dozens of unions are planning a rally in
Washington, D.C., adding to mounting pressure on Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) to stand up to President Donald Trump, who is refusing to back a budget bill without $5.7 billion in funding for his “ridiculous” border wall.

Announcing the rally at AFL-CIO’s D.C. headquarters, which is scheduled to kick of at noon local time on Thursday, organizers said the union-led event was planned “to protest the continuing shutdown and resulting furloughs that are financially hurting 800,000 federal employees and families.” Speakers will included furloughed federal employees, union leaders, and members of Congress. Continue reading →

As Wisconsin’s GOP-controlled legislature and outgoing Republican Gov. Scott Walker seek to thwart the will of voters by ramming through a sweeping slate of legislation that would drastically curtail Democratic governor-elect Tony Evers’ authority and ability to implement his agenda, progressive advocacy groups announced emergency rallies on Monday to fight back against the GOP’s latest “shocking and naked power grab.”

“This is straight out of a banana republic and should be a huge national story,” Mother Jones reporter Ari Berman said of the GOP plan, which would strip Evers’ power to approve decisions by the newly elected Democratic state attorney general and hand this authority over to the Republican legislature. Continue reading →

With Trump’s support, the GOP “has spent the last two years doing everything they can to reach onto our pockets, steal our money, and give it to their pay masters on Wall Street.”

Following the news this week that under President Donald Trump, the federal deficit exploded to $779 billion in the 2018 fiscal year, the president said Wednesday that he would demand a five percent budget cut from each of his cabinet secretaries.

Stressing that the administration would “continue with the tax cuts, because we have other tax cuts planned,” Trump suggested the deficit was the result of spending on various programs at the Departments of Education, Health and Human Services, and other government agencies. Continue reading →

Mary Mayhew “destroyed Medicaid in Maine now she will destroy it in the whole country.”

Maine’s former Health and Human Services Commissioner Mary Mayhew has been tapped to run Medicaid on a national level. Photo: WFVX

Provoking immediate warnings about what is now in store for the most vulnerable people in the United States, President Donald Trump on Monday reportedly tapped Maine’s former health commissioner Mary Mayhew—who was instrumental in Republican Gov. Paul LePage’s efforts to block Medicaid expansion in the state—to run the program at the federal level.

Critics such as Zak Ringelstein, a Democratic U.S. Senate candidate from Maine, rapidly denounced her appointment as “horrifying.” Continue reading →

“This is yet another shameful tax law that would swindle working families and siphon even more funding from the programs that help our communities thrive.”

“In less than a year, House Republicans have handed out trillions of tax cuts for the wealthy and big corporations,” added Rep. Richard Neal (D-Mass.), ranking member of the House Ways and Means Committee. (Photo: Tax March)

With the nation’s attention rightly transfixed by the Senate GOP’s monstrous efforts to ram through a Supreme Court nominee who has been credibly accused by multiple women of sexual assault, House Republicans on Friday voted overwhelmingly to approve another $3 trillion in tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans just weeks before the November midterms.

“Today the GOP doubled down on last year’s giveaway to the donor class known as the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act,” Morris Pearl, chair of the Patriotic Millionaires, said in a statement following the 220-191 vote. “Tax Cuts 2.0 gives nearly $3 trillion to the wealthiest Americans, and will become yet another excuse for Republicans to slash Medicare and Social Security.”

“Think how many kids we could put through college, roads we could pave, families that could get child care, seniors that could get help with prescription drugs with that much money. Shame!”

In their latest “reckless and stupid” bid to deliver massive rewards to ultra-wealthy Americans, House Republicans on Monday introduced three pieces of legislation that make up the GOP’s so-called “Tax Reform 2.0” package.

But with less than two months to go before crucial midterm elections, early estimates indicate the GOP’s proposals would blow a nearly $3 trillion hole in the federal budget over ten years while sending the vast majority of the benefits to the top. Continue reading →

“If every major country on Earth can guarantee healthcare to all, and achieve better health outcomes, while spending substantially less per capita than we do, it is absurd for anyone to suggest that the United States cannot do the same.”

Judging by the headlines alone, it would appear that the newly published study projecting that Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-Vt.) widely popular Medicare for All plan would cost $32.6 trillion over the next decade was conducted by an official, neutral body seeking the facts, not pushing an agenda.

The Congressional Progressive Caucus’ plan “invests in our neglected infrastructure, ends the systematic inequality in our tax system by making corporations pay their fair share, and stops the rising cost of drugs.”

“The People’s Budget embodies that new vision by investing in the interests of the people over the interests of the arms industry and the billionaire class,” Paul Kawika Martin, senior director for policy and political affairs at Peace Action, noted in a statement on Tuesday. (Photo: Congressional Progressive Caucus)

Offering an ambitious alternative to the House GOP’s “morally bankrupt” 2019 budget proposal—which demands over $5 trillion in cuts to Social Security, Medicaid, and other life-saving programs—the Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC) on Tuesday unveiled a budget that calls for massive investments in infrastructure, healthcare, and education while proposing significant cuts to the completely “out-of-control” Pentagon budget.